Ouija: A Research

Before anything else, let us ask ourselves, what is a Ouija (often pronounced as "wee-gee")? Any ideas? Ok, for those who do not know what is Ouija, allow me to reduce your ignorance of the subject.

Ouija: The Definition

According to Wikipedia: A Ouija is any flat surface printed with letters, numbers, and other symbols, to which a planchette or movable indicator points, supposedly in answer to questions from people at a séance. The fingers of the participants are placed on the planchette that then moves about the board to spell out messages. Ouija is a trademark for a talking board currently sold by Parker Brothers. While the word is not considered a generic trademark, it has become a trademark which is often used generically to refer to any talking board. In popular culture these boards are considered to be a spiritual gateway used to contact the dead; however, the only evidence for this is the various accounts of users.

Ouija's History

There are many rumors regarding the history of Ouija or Talking/Spirit Board. Some people believed that Ouija Boards are ancient dating back as far as 1200 B.C., while some said that it dates back to 540 B.C.

Ouija was even related to an ancient Chinese spirit writing called Fu Ji (扶乩). Other sources claim that according to a French historical account of the philosopher Pythagoras, his sect would conduct séances at a mystic table, moving on wheels, moved towards signs, which the philosopher and his pupil, Philolaus, interpreted to the audience as being revelations supposedly from an unseen world. However, there is no actual historical record of Pythagoras or his students actually having used this method of achieving oracles or divinations. In addition, the claim of ancient Greek use is called into doubt by questions of historical accuracy, as Philolaus was never the pupil of Pythagoras, and indeed was born roughly twenty-five years after Pythagoras's death.

Frank Gaynor’s 1953 Dictionary of Mysticism states that ancient boards of different shapes and sizes “were used in the sixth century before Christ.” In a wide range of books and articles, everyone from the Greeks to the Mongols to the Ancient Egyptians is said to have possessed Ouija-like devices. But the claims rarely withstand scrutiny.

Other writers tend to relate Ouija with other divination tools, such as pendulum dishes, for Ouija boards. Oracles were rich and varied from culture to culture – from Germanic runes to Greek Delphic rites – but the prevailing literature on oracular traditions supports no suggestion that talking boards, as we know them, were in use before the Spiritualist era.

Now, note that all of the claims above have no supporting evidences, therefore, as true paranormal researchers, we tend to consider them as exaggerations. The only historical events that is considered factual are base on the surviving documents that traces back to the Spiritualist movement of the 1800s.

According to Lewis Spence's earlier book, An Encyclopedia of Occultism (1920), the planchette (the pointer used in Ouija) was invented in 1853 by a French Spiritualist named M. Planchette, who created a small heart-shaped table that had pencils for legs. As the planchette, as it came to be known, moved, it wrote out spirit messages. This was a form of "automatic writing" and was often difficult to decipher. However, there is some question about whether M. Planchette ever really existed, especially since the word planchette (French for "little plank") would be a logical name for the little automatic writing tool, even without the inventor’s name.

During the late 1800s, planchettes were widely sold as a novelty. The businessmen Elijah Bond and Charles Kennard had the idea to patent a planchette sold with a board on which the alphabet was printed. The patentees filed on May 28, 1890 for patent protection and thus had invented the first Ouija board. Issue date on the patent was February 10, 1891. They received U.S. Patent 446,054.

Charles Kennard and his Kennard Novelty Company are responsible for being the first to patent the Ouija. He called the new creation "Ouija" because he claims that the board told him that Ouija was Egyptian for "Good Luck." Well, Ouija isn't really "Good Luck" in Egyptian but no one seemed to know or care. Since then, this is how it came to be known up until now.

His advertisements claimed that the Ouija board would "give an intelligent answer to any question". Unfortunately for Kennard, his shop foreman orchestrated a hostile takeover by his financial backers and by 1892, the Ouija board was in the hands of William Fuld.

Fuld reinvented the history of the Ouija board once he owned the company. He claimed he had invented the talking board and that the name came from a combination of Oui (French) and Ja (German) – making the name of the board "Yes, Yes." He also claimed to be guided in business by the board.

In 1898, William and his brother Isaac went into business together under the name Isaac Fuld and Brother, leasing the "Ouija" name from The Ouija Novelty Company. In addition to talking boards, the brothers also manufactured pool tables and other billiards accessories.

By 1901, the brothers' partnership had ended in a bitter feud. William Fuld changed the name of his company to the William Fuld Manufacturing Company. Going against an injunction, Isaac continued to manufacture talking boards under the name "Oriole" that were exact replicas of the boards that he and his brother had made. William sued his brother in a case that remained open until 1919.

William Fuld’s first talking board trademark, "Oracle", was filed in 1902. A crafty businessman, Fuld sued companies whose talking boards infringed on his trademarks or patents. It cannot be said whether or not he actually took himself seriously. However his numerous publicity stunts made the talking board a very successful product for Fuld, claiming in 1920 that the Ouija board had made him more than $1 million in profit.

In order to combat the growing competition for other talking board manufacturers, Fuld knew that if he himself made a cheaper version of his own product he would get more business. In 1919, he introduced the "Mystifying Oracle", an exact replica of his Ouija board that sold for less money. He also launched a line of trademarked Ouija jewelry and Ouija Oil for rheumatism. Fuld also trademarked the names "Egyptian Luck board", "Hindu Luck board" and "WE-JA" as well as a trademark detailing the way the word "Ouija" would be displayed.

William Fuld became a member of the Baltimore General Assembly in 1924. On February 24, 1927, Fuld climbed to the roof of his three-story factory to supervise the installation of a flagpole. When the rail against which he was leaning gave way, Fuld fell to the ground below. While being transported, a fractured rib pierced his heart and William Fuld died at the hospital. Witnesses reported Fuld’s fall was an accident, but rumors persist that Fuld committed suicide, others say that he was possessed by his own board.

After Fuld’s death, his children ran the company until 1966, when they sold the business to Parker Brothers. Parker Brothers moved the manufacturing of Ouija boards to Salem, Massachusetts. In the first year of production in Salem, Ouija boards outsold Monopoly. Over two million boards were shipped. Today, Parker Brothers owns all the trademarks and patents to the Ouija board, though they stopped manufacturing the traditional Fuld (wooden hardboard version) Ouija and sell a smaller glow-in-the-dark version instead.

Parker Brothers does not manufacture the only talking board, however, and many styles exist to match prevailing trends in mysticism and New Age beliefs. Some of the prettiest boards claim to put the user in touch with angels and carry the angle motif on both the board and the planchette. About 10 brands of talking boards are sold today under various names.

Even disregarding the mysticisms surrounding Ouija, it still has a very cloudy past at best.

The Paranormal Side of Ouija

Ouija had been used by mediums in séance as a means to communicate with the spirit of the dead, or with other spirits. The users or operators claimed that once a spirit tries to make contact, the planchette, with which, the operators' hands were assembled, tends to move on itself, despite the operators' absent of will.

Some people believe, however, that the motion of the planchette is explained by the ideomotor effect - a psychological phenomenon wherein a subject makes motions unconsciously (i.e., without conscious awareness). A typical session with the board has two or more people touching the planchette with at least one hand each, so that no single person need apply much force in order for the group as a whole to cause it to move. Each person experiences the illusion that the planchette moves under its own power.

Skeptic and magician James Randi, in his book An Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds, and Hoaxes of the Occult and Supernatural, points out that when blindfolded, Ouija board operators are unable to produce intelligible messages. Magicians Penn and Teller performed a similar demonstration in an episode of their cable television show Bullshit!, in which the operators moved the planchette into what they thought was the positions of "yes" and "no" without knowing that the board was turned upside-down, which caused them to move the planchette into blank spaces on the board.

Spiritualists who believe Ouija boards can be used to make actual contact with the spirit world feel that the act of hindering a medium's ability to use his or her own eyes while the board is in use, effectively places too great of a handicap on the whole exercise. This argument stems from the belief that contacted spirits actually utilize the eyes of the medium during a Ouija session in order to point to the letters and words needed to form a message. Most believers of this notion believe that the board has no intrinsic power in and of itself, but rather, is used simply as a tool to aid a medium while in communication with the spirit world. Although many people have made positive connections with the Ouija board, there have been several horrifying myths and stories.

Ouija in Literature

Talking boards have become an iconic part of culture, demonstrated by their appearances in many books and movies. Their roles in such vary from being a benign object to an evil entity. A more peculiar role of talking boards in literature stems from authors using the board to channel complete written works from the deceased.

In the early 1900s, St. Louis housewife Pearl Curran used her Ouija board communications with the ubiquitous spirit Patience Worth to publish a number of poems and prose. Pearl claimed that all of the writings came to her through séances, which she allowed the public to attend. In 1917 writer Emily G. Hutchings believed she had communicated with and written a book dictated by Mark Twain from her Ouija board. Twain's living descendants went to court to halt publication of the book that was later determined to be so poorly written that it could not have been written by Twain dead or alive.

Sylvia Plath's poem Ouija was influenced by the experiments she and Ted Hughes made with a board. Her Dialogue over a Ouija Board, written in 1957, incorporates the text of one of the sessions.

Author John Fuller used a Ouija board in his research for his 1976 book The Ghost of Flight 401. As he was skeptical of its effectiveness, he worked with a medium and claimed they both contacted Don Repo, the flight engineer on the flight which crashed into the Everglades en route to Miami. According to Fuller, the information divined described facts that neither he nor the medium previously knew.

More recently, Pulitzer Prize winning poet James Merrill used a Ouija board and recorded what he claimed were messages from a number of deceased persons. He combined these messages with his own poetry in The Changing Light at Sandover (1982).

Criticism of Ouija boards

Although Ouija boards are viewed by some to be a simple toy, there are people who believe they can be harmful, including Edgar Cayce, who called them "dangerous." Critics warn that "evil demons" pretend to be cooperative ghosts in order to trick players into becoming spiritually possessed.

Some practitioners claim to have had bad experiences related to the use of talking boards by being haunted by "demons," seeing apparitions of spirits, and hearing voices after using them. A few paranormal researchers, such as John Zaffis, claim that the majority of the worst cases of so-called demon harassment and possession are caused by the use of Ouija boards. The American demonologists Ed and Lorraine Warren, stated that "Ouija boards are just as dangerous as drugs." They further state that "séances and Ouija boards and other occult paraphernalia are dangerous because 'evil spirits' often disguise themselves as your loved ones—and take over your life."

In 1944, occultist Manly P. Hall, the founder of the Philosophical Research Society and an early authority on the occult in the 20th century, stated in Horizon magazine that, "during the last 20-25 years I have had considerable personal experience with persons who have complicated their lives through dabbling with the Ouija board. Out of every hundred such cases, at least 95 are worse off for the experience." He went on to say that, "I know of broken homes, estranged families, and even suicides that can be traced directly to this source."

Many Christians hold the belief that using a Ouija board allows communication with demons, which they say is Biblically forbidden as a form of divination. Deuteronomy 18:11-12 says that anyone engaged in these practices is "detestable to God." According to Old Testament Law, the Israelites were supposed to stone (execute) anyone who was a medium or a channeler (Leviticus 20:27).

In Isaiah 8:19-20, God says this: "When men tell you to consult mediums and spiritists, who whisper and mutter, should not a people inquire of their God? Why consult the dead on behalf of the living? If they do not speak according to this word, they have no light..." Some people who claim to have been oppressed by evil spirits after using a board say that they could only get rid of these problems after Christian deliverance. Many Christians believe that no dead person's soul can be summoned, and that the only summoned spirits are demons who are trying to harm humans.

As early as 1924, Harry Houdini wrote that five people from Carrito, California were driven insane by using a board. That same year, Dr. Carl Wickland in his book stated that "the serious problem of alienation and mental derangement attending ignorant psychic experiments was first brought to my attention by cases of several persons whose seemingly harmless experiences with automatic writing and the Ouija board resulted in such wild insanity that commitment to asylums was necessitated."

The former medical director of the State Insane Asylum of New Jersey, Dr. Curry, stated that the Ouija board was a "dangerous factor" in unbalancing the mind and believed that if their popularity persisted insane asylums would be filled with people who used them.

Decades later, in 1965, parapsychologist Martin Ebon in his book Satan Trap: Dangers of the Occult, states that "it all may start harmlessly enough, perhaps with a Ouija board," which will, "bring startling information... establishing credibility or identifying itself as someone who is dead. It is common that people... as having been 'chosen' for a special task." He continues, "Quite often the Ouija turns vulgar, abusive or threatening. It grows demanding and hostile, and sitters may find themselves using the board compulsively, as if 'possessed' by a spirit, or hearing voices that control or command them."

In her 1971 autobiography, the psychic Susy Smith said, "Warn people away from Ouija and automatic writing. I experienced many of the worst problems of such involvement. Had I been forewarned by reading that such efforts might cause one to run the risk of being mentally disturbed, I might have been more wary."

Additionally, the late Roman Catholic priest Malachi Martin believed talking boards are dangerous and claimed that by using these devices a person opens themselves to demonic oppression or possession, topics upon which Martin spoke and wrote extensively for many years.

Crowley and Modern Occultism

Little is published regarding Aleister Crowley's advocacy of the Ouija Board. Yet, he had great admiration for the use of one and the Ouija board played a passing role in his magical workings.

Jane Wolfe, who lived with Crowley at his infamous Abbey of Thelema, also used the Ouija board. She credits some of her greatest spiritual communications to use of this implement. Crowley also discussed the Ouija board with another of his students, and the most ardent of them, Frater Achad (Charles Stansfeld Jones): it is frequently mentioned in their unpublished letters.

Throughout 1917 Achad experimented with the board as a means of summoning Angels, as opposed to Elementals. In one letter Crowley told Jones: "Your Ouija board experiment is rather fun. You see how very satisfactory it is, but I believe things improve greatly with practice. I think you should keep to one angel, and make the magical preparations more elaborate."

Over the years, both became so fascinated by the board that they discussed marketing their own design. Their discourse culminated in a letter, dated February 21, 1919, in which Crowley tells Jones, "Re: Ouija Board. I offer you the basis of ten percent of my net profit. You are, if you accept this, responsible for the legal protection of the ideas, and the marketing of the copyright designs. I trust that this may be satisfactory to you. I hope to let you have the material in the course of a week." In March, Crowley wrote to Achad to inform him, "I'll think up another name for Ouija." But their business venture never came to fruition and Crowley's new design, along with his name for the board, has not survived.

Crowley has stated, of the Ouija Board, that, "There is, however, a good way of using this instrument to get what you want, and that is to perform the whole operation in a consecrated circle, so that undesirable aliens cannot interfere with it. You should then employ the proper magical invocation in order to get into your circle just the one spirit you want. It is comparatively easy to do this. A few simple instructions are all that is necessary, and I shall be pleased to give these, free of charge, to any one who cares to apply."

Other Notable Users

GK Chesterton used a Ouija board. Around 1893 he had gone through a crisis of skepticism and depression, and during this period Chesterton experimented with the Ouija board and grew fascinated with the occult.

Poet James Merrill used a Ouija board for years, and even encouraged entrance of spirits into his body. He wrote the poem "The Changing Light at Sandover" with the help of a Ouija board. Before he died, he recommended people to not use Ouija boards.

Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi claimed under oath that, in a séance held in 1978 with other professors at the University of Bologna, the "ghost" of Giorgio La Pira spelled the name of the street where Aldo Moro was being held by the Red Brigades in a Ouija. According to Peter Popham of The Independent: "Everybody here has long believed that Prodi's ouija board tale was no more than an ill-advised and bizarre way to conceal the identity of his true source, probably a person from Bologna's seething far-left underground whom he was pledged to protect."

Bill Wilson the co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous used the Ouija Board to contact spirits. His wife said that he would get messages directly without even using the board. For a while, his participation in AA was deeply affected by his involvement with the Ouija board. Wilson claimed that he received the twelve step method directly from a spirit without the board and wrote it down.

The investigators of Most Haunted have been known to use Ouija Boards.

Gerard Way, the lead vocalist of My Chemical Romance, has claimed to have had strange encounters with Ouija boards.

Razorlight singer Johnny Borrell is said to have used a Ouija board to help him write songs, particularly "Keep the Right Profile" and "Hold On".

During sleepovers with her friends, Amy Carter would use a Ouija board to get into contact with Abraham Lincoln, whose spirit is believed to haunt the Lincoln Bedroom.

The Fiery Furnaces said that they used a Ouija board to write lyrics for their forthcoming album Widow City

Bone Thugs-N-Harmony are noted for their use of the Ouija board during their highschool years. They made songs called "Mr. Ouija" and "Mr. Ouija 2". The group has since said that they quit using the Ouija board.

'70s powerpop band Cheap Trick got its name from a Ouija board. They asked it what was for dinner, and by collectively moving the planchette, they spelled out "Cheap trick."

On the July 25, 2007 edition of the paranormal radio show Coast to Coast AM, host George Noory attempted to carry out a live Ouija board experiment on national radio despite the strong objections of one of his guests, Jordan Maxwell, and with the encouragement of his other guests, Dr. Bruce Goldberg, Rosemary Ellen Guiley and Jerry Edward Cornelius. In the days and hours leading up to the show, unfortunate events kept occurring to Noory's friends and family as well as some of his guests, but these events would likely be considered coincidences by skeptics. After recounting a near-death experience in 2000 and noting bizarre events taking place, Noory canceled the experiment.

Morrissey was a prominent believer. He has a song titled Ouija Board, Ouija Board.

In the popular 1973 film The Exorcist, Regan MacNeil uses a Ouija board to speak to the demon that she calls Captain Howdy.

In 1963, Jane Roberts and her husband, Robert Butts, experimented with a Ouija board as part of Robert's research for a book on extra-sensory perception. According to Roberts and Butts, on December 2, 1963 they began to receive coherent messages from a male personality who eventually identified himself as Seth. Jane Roberts authored three books of channeled material from Seth.

In the music video of "Bittersweet" (Apocalyptica feat. Ville Valo and Lauri Ylönen), Ville and Lauri are seen using a Ouija board.

Matthew Bellamy, lead singer of rock band Muse, has said that his mother was a medium. When he was a young boy, he and his family played with Ouija boards.

The Mars Volta have written the album, The Bedlam in Goliath in an attempt to reverse the bad luck from a Ouija board that Omar Rodriguez-Lopez bought on a trip to Jerusalem and later buried after a disastrous tour. The Vinyl version will come with it's own Ouija board built into the gatefold.

In one episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus, a squad of police officers use a Ouija board to obtain information about a suspect. They receive the message "UP YOURS".

In the TV show Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Meatwad gets a game for his Atari called Video Ouija and when he turns two joysticks upside down and draws a pentagram on the floor, he can contact the dead people trapped in the game.

Final Word

So that's in a nutshell. We have heard a lot regarding Ouija, we have found out that some people play it as spirit of the glass. It's kinda strange that what was purposely created as a toy became a popular tool for séance. We strongly believe that Ouija has no power in itself, and we can say it so because a Ouija cannot move on itself. However, when operators decide to try it, that's when paranormal events took place. Maybe, Science has a right to say that all this Ouija stuff is bullshit, considering the fact that operators also fail on numerous attempts, and that they have a higher rate of failure when blindfolded. The Idiomotor effect as explained by science could be the reason behind the supposed paranormal event, however, note that even Science has it's own wonder. Idiomotor effect in a sense is a physical manifestation that couldn't be explained beyond the emperical basis. What causes Idiomotor and why it occurs is a mystery even to Science.

Well, factual evidence seems to be in favor of both the paranormal and normal, that is since a physical explanation could be provided through emperical basis, howbeit, lacking some grounds on the subject, while the occult seems to have the freedom to explain base on ad hoc hypothesis, but also fails to provide an accurate and more tangible information. This eventually leads us into a mystery. A stalemate on both sides.

Now, with an unbiased thought, we make our attempt to delve into the subject. First of all, we consider the facts that Ouija cannot operate on itself and it needs operators, therefore, it's possible that the operators are the ones responsible for the supposedly claimed paranormal or spiritual occurrence. With each successful session, operators believe in the genuineness of the Ouija. And having gained their trust, a delusion may follow, at least, that is what in a scientific point of view. But, Science is a mystery even unto itself, for why we have said this is because, there is no way to directly examine the causes, save for basing it on Psychology textbooks (which is of course, based on scientific studies), and getting a delusion may have some spiritual connection. That is why spiritualists take charge to explain what's beyond the realm of Science.

With regards to the spiritual point of view, Some believe that Ouija is the cause, but some others believe that it's the operators, who, by opening their thoughts into the spirit world have managed to make contact with an astral entity. The Ouija only served as a handicap, that is because of the legend that was passed with it, a legend which seems to have help strengthen the operators' confidence and belief. Such faith seems to have accidentally tapped a person's hidden abilities. Another thing that we also considered is the fact that operators most likely fail when blindfolded. Isn't it that spirits need no eye to see? And if it has one, why use the operators' eye? Some spiritualists believe that spirits do need the operators eye to see our world, which only shows that the operators were once again responsible and not the Ouija.

Some people believed that the Ouija can become possessed by a spirit, but, in our own point of view, it looks like the operators were the ones being possessed and not the board. Why? The operators were the ones who report demonic harassment and possessions, while the Ouija neither said a word. And if indeed, an Ouija had be possessed, that is thanks to the operator.

The Ouija, however, has some uses in séance, because of it, the contacted spirit's words could be put into writing, so it does serve as a medium of communication, however, such a method of communication could be risky, and without proper knowledge and experience, this whole séance activity could lead to disaster. Let me put it this way, the Ouija is not dangerous, but you could make it dangerous. That my friend, depends on you.

We haven't personally tried the Ouija yet, but if we do, we'll add more journals regarding the subject in the future.

GPrincess
Psionist Group Founder